


Send A Bullet Through This Dream

by flipflop_diva



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst and Feels, Clint Feels, Clint Has Issues, F/M, Natasha Feels, POV Natasha Romanov, Pre-Canon, Remix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-29
Updated: 2016-07-29
Packaged: 2018-07-27 11:44:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7616794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flipflop_diva/pseuds/flipflop_diva
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha never expected coming face to face with the boy she has dreamed of her whole life would be like this. But then, she's always known that happily ever after isn't really a thing. A remix of Geckoholic's fic "Stay Away From the Sun"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Send A Bullet Through This Dream

**Author's Note:**

  * For [geckoholic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/geckoholic/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Stay Away From The Sun](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5563324) by [geckoholic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/geckoholic/pseuds/geckoholic). 



> Geckoholic, I love your fic so much. It's so well-written and just gets sweeter and sadder each time I read it. I didn't want to change much about the world you created, so I went for some 'missing scenes' instead. I really hope you like it and that I did even a little justice to what you wrote!

_Meant to be_ isn’t at all how Natasha expects it to be. She sees it on his face from the instant he drops his bow the first time they meet face to face, sees the grimace on his lips and the furrow of his brows. She thinks then that it’s because he’s disobeying orders, offering her a way out instead of taking her out as he was expected to.

She understands that. She fears disobeying orders too. Her handlers, her superiors — their word has been everything for almost as long as she can remember, and the punishments for not following the rules are always severe. It’s a life she has long gotten used to, so much so that the dreams she once used to have of her time before the Red Room, her time with her parents, now seems as if it belongs to someone else. 

Going with him is not an order her superiors would ever give her. Going with him is not what she is supposed to do, but she does it anyway. She takes a step toward him and makes her own choice, although it is not hard to choose. 

Going with him is what she has been waiting for her entire life, ever since she first met him in their dreams and realized who he was to her, so she willingly follows his lead, doesn’t think about a different path. She is tired of being someone’s slave. She is tired of wondering what it must be like to make her own decisions.

This is the first decision that is really, truly hers. She savors the taste of it as she nods at him and does everything he says. She has been looking for this boy since she was a small girl. It is not a hard choice, but it feels good to have made it.

He tells her his name is Clint and gives her a rough synopsis of who he works for. She already knows of course — she has seen it all in their shared dreams — but she listens eagerly and nods in kind. She wants to ask him questions, even though his life story is already embedded in her head and her soul, but once he finishes the basic facts, he turns away from her, crosses his arms across his chest.

She thinks he still feels bad about disobeying orders and is worried about what might happen. She is worried too.

So she stays quiet and watches the tension in his posture, feeling confident that she is where she is supposed to be.

He takes her back to the people he works for, leaves her in a room with a single chair, tells her to wait for him. She nods, but he looks unsure. He pulls a pair of handcuffs from the pack on his bag and fastens one end around her wrist and the other around the arm of the chair. Then he leaves her alone.

She knows she could escape from the cuffs in less than a second if she wanted to, but she leaves them be. She doesn’t want her boy — Clint — to be in trouble because of her, and she thinks this all must be hard for him. So she waits, sitting upright in the chair, perfect posture, a blank expression — the one her handlers taught her many years before — across her face.

It isn’t Clint who returns to her, and the realization and sudden worry that maybe something happened to him because he disobeyed orders causes a stray flicker of emotion to cross her face before she can reel it in. She’s disappointed in herself for that, but she steels her expression and her body to glance at the two men who did come.

She’s not sure what she expects — perhaps they will kill her or torture her or, worst of all, send her back — but they only talk to her, give her ground rules and march her down the hall to another man — a doctor this time — who puts her through tests and gives her drugs and makes her talk until they decide she isn’t going to kill them after all.

She was never going to kill them, but she supposes she wouldn’t trust herself either.

It all takes days, weeks, maybe months. She isn’t really sure. Each night, they lead her to a small white room with a plain bed and a dresser she has no real use for and lock her in — until they are sure of her, they say — but on none of those nights does Clint come to see her. She thinks he must not be allowed; actions that go against the rules have consequences, and these must be his.

She never once thinks it’s because he doesn’t want anything to do with her.

After the doctors at SHIELD earn their paychecks and determine she is not going to kill everyone in their sleep, they let her out of what she has come to think of as her cage to train with the other agents. None of them can come close to matching her, and she feels proud of this, especially when she sees Clint watching her from across the room. He always watches, hour after hour, and she likes that he wants to see her. 

A couple weeks in, he pushes the agent next in line aside and steps in front of her. She feels her heart leap in her chest because she has been waiting for this moment and she can’t contain the small smile on her face. He can match her better than anyone else. He’s watched her fight for years in their shared dreams, just as she has watched him.

Neither holds back, and they go round and round for what feels like hours but is really just minutes. She finally gets the upper hand, forces him down to the mat. She is smiling at him, but the look in his eyes is cold. She blinks as something akin to surprise settles in her gut and lets him up before she can even comprehend what she’s seeing.

She follows him when he departs, dispersing quickly through the crowd of agents gawking at them, all the way to his room. He shuts the door in her face, and for the first time since she has arrived, she realizes that she was wrong. 

He is not staying away from her because he has been ordered to or forced to or because he feels guilty. He is staying away from her because he wants to.

It stings, and for the first time in as long as she can remember, Natasha almost wants to cry. Instead, she walks back to her small empty room and sits on the bed, where she stares at the wall until the sun comes up, all the while wondering if maybe she made a mistake.

•••

The morning after Clint literally shuts her out, Natasha makes up her mind that she hasn’t made a mistake. The memories of her parents are a lot blurrier than they used to be, but she can still hear her mother’s words, talking about fate. 

Clint is her fate. She knows that. She just has to figure out how to fix things with him.

It takes her a few days before she finally gets up the nerve to ask. She doesn’t want to push him away more than she already seemingly has.

“What am I doing wrong?” she asks when they are alone, and he turns, blinks at her.

“You're not doing anything wrong.”

Natasha cocks her head. She didn’t expect that answer. “Then why are you... like you are? Distant. Shutting me out when you should yearn to let me in.”

“Fate doesn't always choose well,” he says and stands up, walking a few steps to take another seat, away from her.

She thinks about this before she follows. This is not anything like what her mother told her. Her mother said fate was never wrong.

She trails after Clint, ignores the full-body sigh he gives at the renewed proximity. Turmoil comes off him in waves. There are more things to be said, questions to be asked, but Natasha's done talking. Instead she inches closer and puts her head on his shoulder, keeps even as he tenses, muscles locking up with fight or flight. But he stays where he is, and so does she.

This is not yet the storybook ending she has imagined, but she also has long since learned that fairytales are not to be believed. And she is nothing if not a fighter.

She keeps her head on his shoulder, feels the warmth of his skin below her, and decides she’ll just have to fight for both of them until he’s ready.


End file.
